PlayStation Network customers have had their personal information and possibly credit cards stolen. Sony just now decided to tell them after six days of service outage for undisclosed reasons.

Playstation Network and billing system has been down for six days, company just now decide to let users know the worst

Sony Computer Entertainment America LLC has just announced some very bad news for Playstation Network (PSN) users (accessible via the PlayStation 3 and PSP) who have made purchases -- they have had their personal info and possibly credit card numbers stolen.

Although we are still investigating the details of this incident, we believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided: name, address (city, state, zip), country, email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, and handle/PSN online ID. It is also possible that your profile data, including purchase history and billing address (city, state, zip), and your PlayStation Network/Qriocity password security answers may have been obtained. If you have authorized a sub-account for your dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have been obtained. While there is no evidence at this time that credit card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility. If you have provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or Qriocity, out of an abundance of caution we are advising you that your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may have been obtained.

But this recent breach is arguably the worse yet, given just how much data is said to have been stolen and the possibility that credit card data was stolen.

Sony states:

We thank you for your patience as we complete our investigation of this incident, and we regret any inconvenience.

But, it writes that customers are now responsible for monitoring their credit card statements and credit stores to watch for any damage. In short the message reads something like, "Sorry guys, but you're on your own now!"

According to outraged commenters the PSN has been down for six days now, but Sony is just now owning up to the fact that there was a massive security breach. Secondary sources point to the network being down since at least April 21.

One must wonder how many more companies will see their customers violated before tech firms start to get the idea that handing valuable data to small third-party providers might not be the best idea. It may be cheap, but as these recent incidents show, the utter lack of security and accountability can lead to many a nightmare.